The journal Science today reports new results on this curious experience, more often associated with the tabloid media. You may recall a New York Times story by Sandra Blakeslee about a year ago (3 Oct 06) in which a Swiss neurologist induced the effect by mild electrical stimulation of the angular gyrus, a region of the brain in the parietal lobe involved in a number of processes related to language and cognition. The effect is attributed to discrepancy between the actual position of the body and the mind's perceived location. The Swiss group has now induced the out-of-body effect without brain stimulation or hallucinogenic drugs by fitting the subject with display goggles that show a video image of the person from a different perspective. It is important in part because out-of-body experiences, particularly when associated with near-death, are often cited as evidence of a soul. The odd belief that the half-million embryonic stem cells left over from in-vitro fertilization have souls is behind objections to using them in research rather than sending them to the autoclave. [Link added]

It's possible that one of the reasons that conservative religionists have initiated the culture wars and have been fighting them so vigorously is that the more perceptive among their leadership can see the writing on the wall. They see that, historically, religion has had to give up more and more ground to the relentless progression of science, and there's no indication that it will ever stop. Despite Stephen Gould's theory about "non-overlapping magisteria", if religions were to be relegated only to things that science cannot say anything about, their influence would be severly minimized, something that, understandably, is anethema to religionists.

As science learns more and more about the physical basis of human psychology and begins to understand how social behavior emerges from it, religions will be threatened even in what is now their most secure redoubt: inculcating and spreading moral behavior. If you think they're fighting hard now, just wait until they start to lose that battle (which they eventually and inevitably will, of course).

If you read unfutz at least once a week, without fail, your teeth will be whiter and your love life more satisfying.

If you read it daily, I will come to your house, kiss you on the forehead, bathe your feet, and cook pancakes for you, with yummy syrup and everything.

(You might want to keep a watch on me, though, just to avoid the syrup ending up on your feet and the pancakes on your forehead.)

Finally, on a more mundane level, since I don't believe that anyone actually reads this stuff, I make this offer: I'll give five bucks to the first person who contacts me and asks for it -- and, believe me, right now five bucks might as well be five hundred, so this is no trivial offer.